I use to get writer's block
whenever I thought of her.
I didn't put anything on paper for
fear I would spell it wrong
or not have agreement of tenses.
I sought a synonym for any word
I was not 100% sure of spelling.
Caught away from a dictionary and needing
to use a particular word,
I developed a special scrawl
that bluffed the spelling.
Punctuation was selected from a
table of random numbers.
I use to get idiot stammers
when I thought of her.
I had to be careful what I said around Nell Hunt
she never missed a thing.
Whenever I read aloud before a group
the ghost of her would be in the audience with her
notebook counting coup on my misstatements.
I stammered as I reconsider the
syntax I was using.
The "ers" in my talk are all
dedicated to Old Nell.
The English Sergeant Major
left me for years
a literary cripple.
But Give Them Hell, Nell
I finally got over you.
I got a computer with a Spellcheck -
a computer that erases so cleanly
that I don't have to start the page
over again
every time I make a mistake.
It saves the drafts and
the dog never chews them up.
I wonder, Nell, if you would have
let me use this IBM.
I'll bet you're thinking
that the stuff I write
would be better not done.
Your senior English class stalled my literary efforts.
Maybe for the sake of the English language
that is the way it should have been.
So, sergeant major you were the match
for anything human.
But, them ol' computer blues finally got you.
Doug Minnis
April 1996